SG OwnBlog

After resolving my Pre Leave blues, I left for home. Naturally it was full of hiccups. But I got good luck almost everywhere. From Bangalore, the bus to Chennai was almost 2 hours late. What happened as a result? A good sleep. From 12 to 6, I had uninterrupted sleep, which was great. When I dropped in Chennai, traffic was low enough to avoid jams yet good enough to let me get an auto rickshaw in time. I would not have got it so quickly had I reached an hour earlier. From there I met a pretty talkative (read smart) salesman cum auto driver. He was instrumental in persuading me from going to the Koyambedu bus stand all the way to the Chennai Airport. Of course he charged almost a hundred bucks extra. But I was tired and I agreed. Problem was that I had reached around 5 hours before the check in time! So then began my wait. Cafe Coffee Day helped little. Even the Expresso seemed insufficient! Staying awake was important and difficult. But here also I was lucky. There was a swe

This leave was hard to come by. For a few hours I thought I won't be able to come. Planned leaves getting cancelled - such a thing can occur to me. Twice in two years! And I am not surprised. Finally, with a lot of luck, some speaking and persuading, I got them and rushed home - quite literally. The day was cloudy and so was my mood. Ran roughshod over both Lali and Shwetha for the occasion. Lali understood, Shwetha, not so much. Before the day was out, I was lucky to get a G made by the MBA ( Most Beautiful Anomaly )

I have seen various types of people in life. From armchair warriors to snobs etc etc. Religious or ethnic hatred is one of the most common that I have seen. But so far all of those had some political ideology mixed with faith. For example I have mixed with conservative Hindus who did not like Muslims, and fanatical Muslims baying for Hindu/Sikh/Jain/Buddhist blood. But the Hindu was invariably a Hindutvadi or a BJP supporter or something of that sort. The Muslim would also be an Islamist. This time I met a third kind - pure hatred, that does not derive it's strength from any political ideology. This beautiful lady hates Muslims without having any affinity to the Hindutva ideology and not even any to Modi or RSS or the like. I am yet to come to terms with the exceptional exception but I will produce her answers to some of my questions, without any modification. I, of course, don't endorse any of this nor do I insinuate that she is a hate monger. I don't wish to portray he

Mysore is a far from neglected when it comes to tourism. Mysore has long been a very beautiful small town with exquisite temples and destroyed forts. Once the capital of the princely state of Mysore, it has now been eclipsed by Bangalore. Even then the history is rich and has extremes of good and bad. Mysore palace topmost point Fake HDR-ed from the Mysore Temple complex - the aura should give you the hint We got a gorilla. If we are to go by what's written on the board outside, he is the sole gorilla in India now. Spotted this bear playing with a few ducks Mysore zoo - The look should tell you what he thinks about me or my camera A temple from the Mysore Palace Complex itself - fake HDR-ed Vrindavan Gardens - The cool thing is that this is built adjacent to the huge dam. The Mysore Palace from the cart that we hired for a round trip. The Mysore Palace - The House of Wodeyar has come to an end though. The last 'king' died a cou

I am approaching the bastion of Indian sickularism. Yes, what is known as God’s own country – this is called Kerala. This is one of those places that make a self-respecting Dharmic person to bash his own head at the mindless exposure to non Dharmic influences. I had plenty of experiences on my way itself. This is not the first time I am going to Kerala though. Actually this is the third time. The first visit was by far the best. It was a family trip to one of the most beautiful places of Kerala, the tourist circuit. From the backwaters of Allipuzha to the silent beauty of Munnar and the expanse of the Periyar, I have seen them all. Kerala is very green; there is no doubt about it. This is not entirely a plus point as I will expand later. The people are okay, I have had very widely mixed interactions as opposed to the people of the rest of India. The route that our train is taking goes from Bangalore to Tamil Nadu, all the while bordering Kerala. It enters Kerala at its ext

I saw the trailer of this movie once and really really liked it. What was really interesting was the Thomas Kretschmann acted in a movie with the same name exactly 20 years back. Stalingrad was released in 1993 and the young Kretschmann played the role of a dutiful but conscientious German leutnant of the ill fated 6th Armee. Here also he comes back, slightly older and rugged. The spectacular visuals, the background sound and the lack of background music makes it a realistic watch. That is all positive that I have to say about this trash. Yes, that's what I will this. Naturally, while watching this I brought in similar scenes of Stalingrad (1993) among other war movies. And in comparison this movies cuts so sorry a figure that I dared not watch the entire movie even! The story starts of slow enough and just completely refused to pick up pace. The entire movie seemed to be directed by an amateur school student, bolstered by some insanely talented special effects team. This made t

Spoiler Alert : If you read this, watching the film may bore you. Yer warned. There are only very few war movies that I did not like. Empire of the Sun is one of them. The war movie directed by none other than Steven Spielberg is set in Shanghai, China during the World War II. It basically documents the life of an young English boy under Japanese occupation. The movie is so bizarre right from the beginning that I often wonder what got into the head of the director. An overly irritating English boy is shown as living the life of extreme luxury while China is being devoured by Japan. So far so good, as that was pretty much what happened in real life as well. But after the Japanese take over the city things become more and more ridiculous. Starting from American adventurers in occupied China to the boy turning into a surrender freak! You would often wonder if the boy is just plain childish or retarded, or God forbid, both! An innocent boy's chronicle of life under foreign oc